Ontario PC leader Patrick Brown says he didn’t know of Jack MacLaren’s plan

TORONTO – Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown says he didn’t know former caucus member Jack MacLaren had been planning to join a fringe party.

Brown kicked MacLaren out of the caucus on Sunday, citing a 2012 video that showed him hinting at a hidden party agenda and making negative comments about French language rights.

But MacLaren says the party had known about the video for years and suggests the real reason for his expulsion was that Brown found out he had joined the Trillium party on Friday.

Brown, who became party leader in 2015, says regardless of whether the previous regime knew about the video, he did not know about it until this past weekend.

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Brown says there had been rumours for about two years that MacLaren was going to form his own party, but he didn’t know anything about MacLaren’s plans to join the Trillium party before he fired him.

In kicking MacLaren out of caucus, Brown said the video was the final straw with a politician who had previously come under fire for vulgar remarks about a female MP, having fake testimonials on his website, and saying a zero tolerance policy for the sexual abuse of patients is dangerous.

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MacLaren, who represented the eastern Ontario riding of Carleton-Mississippi Mills, took his seat in the legislature this week as an independent, since the Trillium party doesn’t have official party status.

MacLaren was the lone vote Tuesday against both a bill to implement photo radar in school zones and to strengthen a zero tolerance policy on the sexual abuse of patients.